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Filled to the Brink…of Chaos

As an organizing consultant, I help my clients take control of their surroundings, their time and their information by designing custom organizing systems for them based on their habits and by teaching them the organizing principles that I have learned over the years. I believe that organizing is both an art (the design) and a science (the principles).

One principle that has been on my mind lately is what I refer to as the Capacity Principle or the seventy-five percent rule.

Capacity can be defined as:

(1) The amount of space that can be filled; room for holding; content or volume.

(2) The point at which no more can be contained; filled to capacity.

My recommendation is that any container, drawer, cabinet, closet or filing cabinet be filled to only three-fourths of the total capacity. The one-fourth empty space allows for ease of retrieval of the contents.